A List
12/7/09
SLU Professor's Book Examines News Coverage Of U.S. Wars
CANTON - A new book by St. Lawrence University Professor of Government Calvin F. Exoo takes a critical look at coverage of the 21st century's number-one news story: terrorism and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
The Pen and the Sword: Press, War and Terror in the 21st Century has been published by Sage Publications. In it, Exoo provides an eye-opening case study of the news at war, and introduces a critical perspective on the mass media.
Among topics included:
- The war in Afghanistan. There were two sides to this story, but the press told only one, and the untold story would return to haunt us.
- The campaign for war in Iraq. What did the press know and when did they know about the web of lies that led us into war?
- Iraq, from invasion to "Mission Accomplished." When the story of war is told as a patriotic hymn, Playstation game, or melodrama of macho heroes and bad guys dressed in black, important things are left out.
- Aftermath, from "Mission Accomplished" to the present. Something has changed since the Vietnam War, when the press finally found its critical voice. Somehow, media in the 21st century continue to cling to an untenable, pro-war story, even after the public has abandoned it.
Also included is up-to-date information on the underpinnings of the news business - corporate ownership and the power of elites to define the news - and adds some important new features of the media landscape: the media profit crisis and how it is affecting the news; the creation and mainstreaming of a new right-wing media surround-sound system; and the increasing importance of entertainment media and "soft news" in shaping public views.
Exoo is also the author of Democracy Upside Down: Public Opinion and Cultural Hegemony in the United States and The Politics of the Mass Media. In 2006, he was selected as a Saul Sidore Lecturer at Plymouth State University, and in 2009, he was named Outstanding Faculty Member by the senior class at St. Lawrence.
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